Will Drug Companies Censor Our MS Cure?

A Possible Cure for Multiple Sclerosis
posted by [Redacted] on Saturday, February 6, 2010
Italian Surgeon Claims High Success Rate Against MS
By Sheila Casey / RCFP A former vascular surgeon from the University of Ferrara in northern Italy has apparently cured his wife and 65 other people of multiple sclerosis (MS) by using balloon angioplasty to open the narrowed veins in their necks. All of the MS patients who have had Paolo Zamboni’s procedure have remained attack-free, as long as their neck veins remained open. But if their veins close up again, their MS symptoms return.Zamboni began hunting feverishly for the cause of MS after his wife was diagnosed with the disease at age 37 and began to deteriorate. MS patients often lose the ability to walk, to talk, to feed themselves, and even to swallow.Scientists have known for more than 100 years that MS patients had excess iron in their brains, but assumed it was a byproduct of the disease. Zamboni noticed that the excess iron was usually in the core of the brain near a vein. In addition, the lesions that form in the brains of MS patients are grouped near veins.Using ultrasound, Zamboni examined the neck veins of MS patients and compared them to the veins of healthy people or those with other neurological diseases. He found that nearly 100% of the MS patients had significant narrowing in the veins that should be carrying blood from the brain back to the heart, while none of the other subjects had this narrowing. In addition, there was a relationship between the amount of narrowing and the severity of disease, with patients with only one blocked vein suffering milder disease and those with two or more blocked veins suffering more severely. He also found narrowing in the central vein that goes down to the heart through the chest, and patients with narrowing there often had the most serious form of MS, known as primary progressive. They deteriorate very rapidly, with no remissions.Zamboni reasoned that the blood that was being forced back into the brain, (because it could not drain as it was supposed to) was leaving behind excess iron, as well as forcing immune cells through the blood-brain barrier and initiating an auto-immune response. Zamboni termed the condition CCSVI, or Chronic Cerebro Spinal Venous Insufficiency.When he showed his findings to some neurologists, they were excited. But, Zamboni says, when he suggested a method to treat the condition, their enthusiasm waned markedly.Zamboni hypothesized that opening up blocked veins with balloon angioplasty – the same procedure used to open blocked blood vessels in cardiac patients – and allowing the blood to drain normally, would stop the build-up of iron in the brain and stop the progression of the disease. He teamed up with vascular surgeon R. Galeotti, and they operated on 65 MS patients with a procedure now dubbed the “Liberation Treatment.” Surgeons thread a thin wire through the vein and into the patient’s neck, where they expand a small balloon at the stricture to open the closed vein. Within seconds, they see the blood begin flowing normally again.All of the 65 patients have shown significant improvement, some immediately. Jeff Beale, an Emmy Award winning music composer, was the first American to have the procedure. He relates that, as the doctors were opening his veins, he felt “the lights come on.” He is now able to perform duets with his son, help his son with his homework, and has the energy to get through the day – whereas before he was continually sidelined by soul-crushing fatigue.Other patients have exclaimed, within 20 minutes of having the procedure, “I can feel my hands!” Within ten days, one woman regained use of her legs. Their health often continues to improve over the following months, with some patients returning to full health and no sign of disease at all. Others do not recover their former capacities, but suffer no new attacks. Zamboni said: “if you maintain open veins, you will not have more attacks, and you will not have active lesions.”Zamboni’s wife Elena was one of the first to have her veins “liberated,” and now, two years later, she has had no more attacks and is considered neurologically normal. “This, for me, is the best prize,” says Zamboni.The results of Zamboni and Galeotti’s study were published in The Journal of Vascular Surgery on November 24, 2009, and the response from MS patients has been overwhelming. Zamboni has been deluged with calls and emails from patients desperate to have the procedure before their condition degrades further.But the response from the MS Societies in both the US and Canada has been dismissive, with the Canadian society urging patients to “not abandon the treatment they are on,” and the US society issuing the following statement: “At the present time, there is insufficient evidence to suggest that this phenomenon is the cause of MS.” They have discouraged patients from seeking treatment, or even getting tested to see if their veins are blocked.When I called the press contact at the National MS Society to ask about CCSVI, I was told that she was busy working with ABC on a story about exciting new oral therapies for MS, and that I could find all I needed about CCSVI on their website. On the society’s webpage titled “Intriguing Leads on the Horizon,” no mention is made of CCSVI.There has been scant coverage of Zamboni’s discovery in the mainstream media. A search for “Paolo Zamboni,” on the websites for The New York Times, Washington Post, LA Times, CNN and MSNBC brings up, again and again, “no results found,” or “no relevant documents.” A Swiss blog called The Daily Bell opines about this news blackout with: “It is too often the same weary story. Establishment scientific institutions and their planetary satellites - non-profits, etc. - huddle together to keep out anything that remotely challenges business as usual. Have you read about this potential MS cure in manifold versions in the mainstream press? You would think that journalists would leap at the opportunity to cover this astonishing research. Maybe there is nothing to this, but mainstream media silence, as usual, seems deafening.”Exempt from this criticism are a few outlets: The Globe and Mail in the UK, W5 TV in Canada, and The Huffington Post’s Erika Milvy, who wrote: “The pharmaceutical industry stands to lose a lot if Zamboni’s one-time treatment pans out. The most common drug therapies for MS cost about $30,000 a year. And there are well over 100 medications for various MS symptoms…On one MS forum is a link to another pharma-gate headline: “Big Pharma’s Crime Spree”, in which the reporter for Bloomberg Markets Magazine assesses that “finding cures is not even remotely a consideration by pharmaceutical executives.”Newly radicalized MS patients are outraged at the media blackout and are banding together to publicize Zamboni’s treatment and help each other find doctors who will test their veins. A search for CCSVI on Facebook brings up 21 recently formed groups with names like “M.S. (Millions Strong to raise awareness of C.C.S.V.I.)” An MS patient named Andrea has created a YouTube channel called MS Vlog Support Group. In a plaintive speech to the camera, she asks. “Where is the news coverage of this? I don’t understand why it’s not all over the place. It boggles the mind.”As has been seen with numerous other diseases, those who make their living from people being sick are far more interested in treating symptoms than in effecting a cure that would have the patient walk out the door and never come back. Evidently these groups – the nonprofit MS societies, neurologists who specialize in treating MS and, most importantly, the pharmaceutical companies, who sold $8.2 billion in MS drugs in 2007 – have the power to suppress the news about this astonishing development. The possible threat to their livelihoods apparently trumps the value of returning health and hope to the two million people worldwide who suffer from MS.Sheila Casey is a DC based journalist. Her work has appeared in The Denver Post, Reuters, Chicago Sun-Times, Dissident Voice and Common Dreams.